According to a popular film and television website, “Meet Me In St. Louis is delightful, classic, nostalgic, poignant, and romanticized”. Some of these words may ring true for the band, but in the most part this is a very different beast. Completely incomparable and definitely something to behold. Taking their name from the popular 1940’s Judy Garland film, the band formed in June 2005 setting up base in Guildford, each member delighted to finally have a chance to enjoy the novelty of writing with a team of equally talented musicians, all set on creating something slightly out of the norm. Blending schizophrenic time-changes, blast beats, huge guitar riffs and catchy vocal hooks sounds like a recipe for disaster but that wasn’t to be the case, with the band quickly rising to the forefront of the UK underground scene and causing jaws to hit the ground right the way across the country with their blistering live assault. In front a crowd is where this band really come into their own. Having perfectly honed their style after playing every toilet venue up and down the UK, as well as a fortnight-long trip around Eastern Europe, it’s about more than the music. Limbs flailing and spilling into the crowd, it’s a live performance you and your painfully ringing ears won’t forget in a long time, and as good a reason as any to why so many people are tipping this band for greatness. The band will be continuously touring throughout September and October with the likes of Hell Is For Heroes and An Emergency amongst others. Their debut EP, the tongue-twisting ‘And with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark – the place where the wave finally broke and rolled back’ (released via local label Function Records in summer 2006) was as well received as it was overly titled. Plaudits in hand Meet Me In St. Louis set about writing their first full-length record. A chance email was sent and new fan and friend-to-be, Alex Newport (the genius behind records from At The Drive-In, The Locust, The Mars Volta, Sepultura and many, many more), flew over to produced the release in January 2007 at the renowned Miloko Studios in London. A tiring two weeks (diarised on the Drowned In Sound website) filled with highs and lows, sound tweaking and illness followed, with the band eventually coming away with what will soon be regarded as one of the debut albums of the year. A truly astonishing record from a band on the verge of following their namesake into genre-defining history.
